Ethics and behaviour – Page 10

The onerous burden of responsibility

Imagine you’re in high school one day around the end of the year. It’s warm outside, sunny, and you want out of the stuffy classroom. You’re not paying attention. You’re looking out the window, fidgeting. Daydreaming, miles away. The teacher drones on and on but you don’t hear a single word. Then, the bell rings. Just before the class leaves, you hear the teacher remind everyone that you are responsible for their safety, you are responsible for their wellbeing, for their health. For all the kids in the school. And their parents, too. And if you don’t do everything right, ……… click below for more ↓

Budget Bullshit

2017-02-21 2017-02-22 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Taxes2 Comments

The first question you have to ask after following Collingwood Council’s sloppy and inept budget process is “Where did the money go?” Then the second question you have to ask, “Are they really that dense?” Yes, but let’s start with the first question. Back when he promoted dismantling the water utility from its partnership with Collus-PowerStream (CPS) and taking the utility under town control – a process that has proven a disaster for the town – the interim CAO promised we’d see a savings of $750,000 a year. But now the town is trying to privatize those water services by ……… click below for more ↓

Empathy and The Dog Allusion

2017-02-16 2017-02-16 Atheism & Spirituality / Books & Reviews / Collingwood / Ethics and behaviour / Faith / Philosophy / Psychology & Sociology / Social Order & Disorder / What I'm Reading NowLeave a comment

Empathy, writes Martin Rowson, is one of the things that make us human, make us civilized, allows us to interact without tearing one another’s throats out. Without it, we’d have no civilization; we’d be like the beasts of the fields. And we’d have no dogs or gods, either. Empathy is what makes us own pets and be religious. That’s one of the thought-provoking ideas Rowson tosses around in his book, The Dog Allusion (Vintage Books, London, 2008). The title, as I’m sure you are aware, is a pun on Richard Dawkins’ book, The God Delusion. Rowson has a lot to ……… click below for more ↓

The EPCOR sales pitches

2017-02-09 2017-02-09 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Utilities: electricity and waterOne Comment

I’m told the interim CAO is distressed – apoplectic, really – that I am aware of his sales pitch information sessions in which he touts the wonders of EPCOR to town staff. Two sessions that I know of. At the most recent one he brought along EPCOR representatives to schmooze the staff. Apparently he is not winning them over. It might be because, as I have been led to believe, Mr. Brown has few fans. I’m told he is generally disliked by many staff. As he is, I’ve also been told, by our municipal partners, our neighbouring municipalities, the hospital ……… click below for more ↓

Monetizing our public assets

2017-02-04 2017-02-04 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / User fees and costs / Utilities: electricity and waterOne Comment

In the town’s disingenuous press release (really just a sales pitch for EPOCR) about its obsessive drive to privatize our utility services, it has this paragraph: The Town’s RFP process solicited proposals from a wide range of potentially interested parties that could maximize the value of the Town’s remaining investment in Collingwood PowerStream Utility Services Corp. Given the terms of the existing Shareholder’s Agreement with PowerStream entered into by the previous Council, the Town has very limited options regarding how it may monetize its remaining 50% investment in the local electricity distribution company. Monetize a public asset? Since when was ……… click below for more ↓

Committee system still broken, still in use

2017-02-03 2017-02-03 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies / Publicity & Communications2 Comments

“A committee,” wrote Sir Barnett Cocks, former Clerk of the UK’s House of Commons, “is a cul-de-sac down which ideas are lured and then quietly strangled.” How very appropriate those words strike us as we gaze at Collingwood’s ineffective, severely broken standing committee system. The brainchild of the interim CAO, and the very model of his business style, it has been fervently embraced by The Block. Yet to outsiders, the committee system has been a bureaucratic quagmire of redundancy and ineptness since its inception. It was a mistake to continue it after the first meeting, when most observers realized it ……… click below for more ↓

The Block lied. Told you so.

2017-01-30 2017-01-30 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Utilities: electricity and waterOne Comment

If you read the media release published by the Town of Collingwood this afternoon you will realized just how much you have been lied to these past two years. It’s titled, “Council to pursue Hydro Share Sale discussions with Epcor.” This is the “unnamed company” whose name The Block and the administration tried – unsuccessfully – to hide from us. But like I warned you: The Block is privatizing our water and wastewater services, too. All without any input or consultation from the public: In addition to submitting an offer on Collingwood’s remaining interest in Collingwood PowerStream Utility Services Corp, ……… click below for more ↓

Will the Block’s hypocrisy never cease?

2017-01-29 2017-01-30 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Taxes / User fees and costsOne Comment

Last term, when they were raising their pitchforks to storm the bureaucratic castle, the members of today’s Collingwood Council – those we disparagingly refer to as The Block – were loudly castigating the former council for having once done a sole-source deal with the company that was the only Canadian supplier of a product in the whole country. Some said we should have gone further afield, to American sources. We were evil, they told their cadre of supporters, for not going to tender, or other process like an RFP. The Block’s leader and now Deputy Mayor, Brian Saunderson pledged his ……… click below for more ↓

Collingwood’s casino roulette

2017-01-29 2017-01-30 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & PoliciesLeave a comment

I want you to read the following motion carefully. Take your time. It was passed by the former council in March, 2013 in response to the Ontario Lottery & Gaming Corporation (OLG) coming forward with a proposal to locate a gambling (“gaming”) facility in Collingwood: WHEREAS a properly developed Integrated Destination Resort which includes but is not limited to a world class accommodation hotel, executive meeting and convention facilities, a large seating capacity theatre, restaurants, spa and boutique casino could benefit the economic growth of the community; AND WHEREAS Council of the Town of Collingwood may be interested in becoming ……… click below for more ↓

The Block torpedoes the hospital, again

2017-01-28 2017-01-28 Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies2 Comments

When their sole-sourced consultant’s report failed to give The Block the high ground to oppose the Collingwood General & Marine Hospital’s redevelopment plan, the weasels on council and in the administration decided to undermine the hospital from a different direction. And they hired another consultant. That’s right: wasting $30,000 of your hard-earned tax dollars on one sole-sourced consultant to “peer review” the CG&M’s already peer-reviewed report wasn’t enough. So they hired a second consultant because the first didn’t say what The Block wanted. How much that second consultant cost taxpayers has not yet been revealed. The first consultant’s report just ……… click below for more ↓

Saunderson announces another tax hike

2017-01-22 2017-01-24 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Taxes3 Comments

At Collingwood Council, Monday night, Deputy Mayor Brian Saunderson revealed The Block’s plan to foist its third tax hike this term on residents. Despite the report on the town’s financial situation by the interim CAO’s pet consultant that warned Collingwood is already overtaxed, Saunderson and his Block plan to raise your taxes AGAIN this term. At the end of the meeting, he made a notice of motion to “keep” the next tax hike at 2%. Well that simply means he’s giving staff the permission to raise it 2%*. Had he been serious about low taxes, about sustainable budgets and wise ……… click below for more ↓

You’ve been duped. Again.

2017-01-21 2017-01-21 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Utilities: electricity and waterOne Comment

Remember all those blithe assurances from The Block that they were only “kicking tires” and “just exploring our options”? Well, there’s a story in the Connection that shows just how much you have been conned by your elected representatives. It’s titled,”Collingwood to continue utility sale negotiations with unnamed bidder.” Read that headline again. Pay attention to two words: negotiations and continue. How can they be “kicking tires” or “exploring options” while continuing to negotiate with a company? A company The Most Secretive Council Ever won’t even name, but had its representatives in the room yesterday? It’s all been a thin ……… click below for more ↓

Collingwood Council’s missed initiatives

2017-01-15 2017-01-15 Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies / Publicity & Communications / Taxes / User fees and costs / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

The word initiative derives from the Latin word initiare “to begin.” Since 1600, it has meant “introduce to some practice or system,” “begin, set going.” While any sort of action or engagement, positive or negative, can be classified as an initiative, generally one refers only to positive enterprises when describing political or social initiatives. I know, I know: you immediately want to interrupt and say, “but Ian, The Block don’t do anything positive, and you cannot talk about a council’s initiatives when none have occurred.” I agree, but bear with me. It’s true that, when measuring the positive actions begun ……… click below for more ↓

Council is privatizing our utilities

2017-01-12 2017-01-14 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies / User fees and costs / Utilities: electricity and water6 Comments

Collingwood council and its administration are planning to privatize both our water and electricity utilities. All, of course, without consulting you, the public. Some members of council have even stated – with a straight face, mind you – they would ask for your input at a later date. A date long after it’s too late for public input to matter, of course. They have already engaged in negotiations with outside companies to take over our utilities, all the while pretending they were just “kicking the tires.” They appointed their lawyer to oversee the sale. Consultants made reports painting the existing ……… click below for more ↓

The PowerStream deadline looms today

2017-01-06 2017-01-06 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Utilities: electricity and water3 Comments

Big day for Collus-PowerStream today: the deadline for acceptance of PowerStream’s sale offer for the remaining share of our utility expires this afternoon. And of course Council will finally deal with it at the special meeting called for noon, today, mere hours before it expires. Nothing like waiting until the last moment. They’ve had a month to deal with it, but that’s our council: inept and procrastinating until the end. Like I wrote in December, if not accepted, this will trigger the shotgun clause in the shareholders’ agreement and force the issue (see below). Council could have avoided the deadline ……… click below for more ↓